No Wonder Audiences Have Connected With Wonder, It's A Real Heartfelt Treat

Live-action family movies that don't star CGI chipmunks or aren't remakes of classic animated Disney fare have become a rarity in theatrically released American cinema to the point that Pure Flix (the studio behind God's Not Dead and other pieces of cinema of similar top-caliber quality) is the only studio in America these days regularly producing such films. That makes Wonder a rarity for sure as well as a reminder of how good these movies can be when produced right. Live-action family movies don't just have to be vehicles for CGI versions of 1960's cartoon characters to make pop culture references, they can instead be actually entertaining movies with heart.

Smurfs: The Lost Village Gets, Well, Lost Trying To Tackle An Interesting Idea

The old axiom "third time's the charm" has been run into the ground as an axiom used in movie reviews to signify that the third entry in a certain movie franchise is the best movie in said movie franchise, but for Smurfs: The Lost Village it's kind of true, though it's more like "Fourth time's the charm" since the Smurfs did have that one animated movie back in the 80's, The Smurfs and The Magic Flute (which I have not seen). Having seen the 2011 Smurfs movie but not its 2013 sequel, I can say that Smurfs: The Lost Village is an improvement over that Raja Gosnell directed motion picture, though it's still got some seriously Smurfed up qualities to it as well.